Best 2TB Hard Drive

davejuk · 12 Aug 2010 at 12:50

With all of the 2TB offerings bunched around the £80 mark, is there really anything in it?

Is one drive clearly better than the others?

With such small differences in price, I don't mind paying a few extra quid for a bit of extra performance.

I'm already probably getting a 256GB SSD for my OS and apps, this would just be for data.

PatZ1989 · 12 Aug 2010 at 16:28

i would wait dave, a few of the manufacturers have claimed they will sell 3 TB by the end of the year

rush_syndrome · 12 Aug 2010 at 18:13

It will be a while yet before 3TB's are main stream, then longer before the wholesalers pass the price down on the smaller drives. Seagate 3TB is out but not here in the UK yet.

davejuk · 12 Aug 2010 at 19:38

Even if 3TB drives did appear tomorrow at £166, 2TB would still be the best price point in my mind at ~£80.

So if we accept that 2TB is the best price point, which manufacturer has the best offering?

If a only look at 7,200RPM disks, the 32MB cache options are;

Hitachi Deskstar 7K2000 2TB SATA-II 32MB Cache - OEM (0F10311)

Western Digital Caviar Black 2TB SATA-II 64MB Cache - OEM (WD2001FASS)

Or for another ~£40 I can get a 64MB cache model.

Is it worth the extra 50% to double the cache?

r0cky · 13 Aug 2010 at 14:47

3TB is a weird number, like those 1.5TB drives. I'm using 2TB now and will wait for 4TB before stepping-up.

Westyfield2 · 13 Aug 2010 at 14:56

Of the storage drives (slower spin speeds), Seagate Barracuda LP 2TB SATA-II 32MB Cache - OEM (ST32000542AS) is the one. Best compromise of noise/speed.

Of the faster 7200RPM drives I don't know

.

r0cky · 13 Aug 2010 at 16:25

For bulk storage I like the WD20EARS, which uses the new sector-size (4K) and better ECC.